A Little Mini-ITX Form Gene History

Introduced by chipset manufacturer VIA Technologies dorsum in 2001, the Mini-ITX form factor measures a mere 17 x 17 cm (6.seven 10 six.7 in). Information technology was designed to promote VIA's low ability C3 processor, which they acquired from Centaur Engineering science. Despite its miniature size, the platform had little impact on the calculator earth and manufacturers never really embraced the applied science.

Eventually information technology became articulate that VIA was struggling to become third-party manufacturer support for their chipsets and embedded CPUs. A reworked strategy dictated to use an in-house motherboard division to get those products direct to market. VIA'south fundamental focus became to standardize low-price compact computing using their own technology.

The company'south first attempt known as the VT6010 Mini-ITX, and later the EPIA 800 and EPIA 5000 motherboards, failed to make any serious inroads into the market. Having spent years trying to flog off Mini-ITX solutions, VIA was trumped by Intel once all the leg work had been completed.

Many years after the VIA C3 and C7 had been introduced, Intel came up with the Atom CPU, which arrived equally a significant leap frontward. Call information technology perfect timing or massive guaranteed partner support, the Atom Z serial saw the light on April 2008. Code-named "Silverthorne", it was a single core processor using a 45nm design process and an impressive thermal envelope of simply 2.4w.

Soon later Intel updated the Cantlet with the "Diamondville" compages, amend known as the Cantlet N serial. The Atom processors became widely used, enabling the widespread use of netbooks. Asus played a big role with their Eee PC series (originally Celeron based). With the rest of the manufacture playing a quick game of take hold of up, information technology wasn't long earlier netbooks loaded with Cantlet processors flooded the marketplace.

With the introduction of the dual-core Cantlet 300 series, manufacturers started to look beyond the netbook, as compact desktop computers became another potential market to tackle.

For years Shuttle pushed their compact XPC computers with some obvious disadvantages inherent to the times. However, Shuttle XPCs cost more than, and even though they can be configured to be powerful smallish PCs, they also consume more power, generate more estrus, and every bit a event make a lot more noise.